TechWorks Marine has been awarded a contract through the ESA InCubed program to develop an innovative coastal monitoring solution – CoastEO Coastal Ocean Assessment using Earth Observation. The project kicked off in January 2020 with a duration of 18 months. Today, more than ever, regulatory agencies, commercial companies and government departments need robust, reliable and secure water quality data.
Our valuable coastal zones harbour biologically diverse ecosystems and rich fishing/aquaculture resources. But coastal zones also hold important socio-cultural values and harbour a diverse range of industries, which provide significant economic productivity. A keen scientific understanding of the physical, chemical and biological drivers and processes in coastal environments is vital for identifying, monitoring and assessing environmental change and the associated impacts on all coastal systems. Today, more than ever, regulatory agencies, commercial companies and government departments need robust, reliable and secure water quality data.
Advances in sensor technology and the explosion of EO data in recent years offers a unique opportunity to develop cost-effective disruptive technologies and greatly advance our understanding of the coastal environment.
TechWorks Marine’s robust and portable MiniBuoy is perfect for measuring water quality parameters (e.g. turbidity/Temperature/Chl-a) in both coastal and freshwater environments. The MiniBuoy has been developed to deploy up to 3 different sensors simultaneously. As part of CoastEO, MiniBuoys equipped with a suite of low-cost sensors will deployed at key locations, evaluated against existing high-cost technology and used to validate satellite EO data. The aim of CoastEO is to develop an easy to deploy system which provides lower cost high quality in-situ data and reliable large scale EO data products. This provides a cost effective means of monitoring your area of water over time, reduces your need to conduct labour intensive sampling and allows you to view live water quality data via a friendly secure web portal.
In partnership with ESA’s Phi-Lab, TechWorks Marine strive to develop an innovative and accessible solution to water monitoring quality in dynamic environments. The service will be developed under ESA’s Investing in Industrial Innovation (InCubed) programme, which specifically supports innovative commercial activities related to Earth Observation.
